Phoebe did not indulge long in grief, however she forgot her weary limbs, and bustling about, soon made up a fire, and boiled some potatoes, which constituted their supper—­after which she nursed the children, two at a time, for a while, and then put them tenderly to bed.  Her husband had not come home, and as he was nearly always intoxicated, and sometimes ill-treated her sadly, she felt his absence a relief.  Sitting over a handful of coals, she attempted to dry her wet feet; every bone in her body ached, for she was not naturally strong, and leaning her head on her hand, she allowed the big tears to course slowly down her cheeks, without making any attempt to wipe them away, while she murmured: 

“Thirteen dollars a year gone!  What is to become of us?  I cannot get help from those authorized by law to assist the poor, unless I agree to put out my children, and I cannot live and see them abused and over-worked at their tender age.  And people think their father might support us; but how can I help it that he spends all his earnings in drink?  And rich as Mrs. Percy is, she did not pay me my wages to-night, and now I cannot get the yarn for my baby’s stockings, and her little limbs must remain cold awhile longer; and I must do without the flour, too, that I was going to make into bread, and the potatoes are almost gone.”

Here Phoebe’s emotions overcame her, and she ceased speaking.  After a while, she continued—­

“Mrs. Percy also blamed me for being so slow; she did not know that I was up half the night, and that my head has ached ready to split all day.  Oh! dear, oh! dear, oh! dear, if it were not for my babes, I should yearn for the quiet of the grave!”

And with a long, quivering sigh, such as one might heave at the rending of soul and body, Phoebe was silent.

Daughters of luxury! did it ever occur to you that we are all the children of one common Parent?  Oh, look hereafter with pity on those faces where the records of suffering are deeply graven, and remember “Be ye warmed and filled,” will not suffice, unless the hand executes the promptings of the heart.  After awhile, as the fire died out, Phoebe crept to her miserable pallet, crushed with the prospect of the days of toil which were still before her, and haunted by the idea of sickness and death, brought on by over-taxation of her bodily powers, while in case of such an event, she was tortured by the reflection—­“what is to become of my children?”

Ah, this anxiety is the true bitterness of death, to the friendless and poverty-stricken parent.  In this way she passed the night, to renew, with the dawn, the toils and cares which were fast closing their work on her.  We will not say what Phoebe, under other circumstances, might have been.  She possessed every noble attribute common to woman, without education, or training, but she was not prepossessing in her appearance; and Mrs. Percy, who never studied character, or sympathized with menials, or strangers,